


Game, Set and Match

by cordeliadelayne



Category: Primeval
Genre: Chess, Conversations, F/M, Flirting, Past Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:15:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28139772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cordeliadelayne/pseuds/cordeliadelayne
Summary: Lester and Christine have a regularly scheduled chess game.
Relationships: Christine Johnson/James Lester
Comments: 4
Kudos: 7





	Game, Set and Match

**Author's Note:**

  * For [knitekat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/knitekat/gifts).



> Written as a Christmas present for the lovely knitekat who gave the prompt “chess."

“Sorry I'm late,” Lester said, sitting down in his usual seat opposite from Christine. “An incident.”

He shrugged in a way that could have meant a meeting with the minister went long or a triceratops had just invaded Kew Gardens.

“I quite understand,” Christine said. She crossed her legs and waited for Lester to make the first move. By some unspoken commandment he was always white.

Lester gave her a careful once over but she seemed her usual self and so he almost nonchalantly moved his pawn forward.

“How is life treating you?” Lester asked. Christine's fingers tapped consideringly against a couple of pieces.

“I went for a walk yesterday,” she said. “The leaves are changing and there's one particular tree that is full of reds I don't think I've ever seen before.”

“Yes,” Lester nodded. “I think I know the one you mean.”

A bishop glided across the board and Lester moved a pawn.

“How are your team?” Christine asked. She took a sip of water from a plastic bottle, the plastic creaking as she exerted more pressure around its middle than was strictly necessary. Lester didn't comment.

“Very well, thank you. Abby and Connor are engaged. There's to be some sort of get together at the weekend.”

“Abby's the blonde one, isn't she? The zoo person.”

“That's right.”

“Quite a kick on her as I seem to remember.”

“She knows how to defend herself. They all do.”

“And Connor, he's the one with the gloves?”

“Yes.”

Christine seemed pleased to have remembered these details and turned back to the chess board, moving a pawn with a seeming carelessness that hadn't fooled Lester for a second.

He concentrated on the board for a few seconds, trying to think four moves ahead and the only conclusion he could come to was that Christine had deliberately sacrificed the piece for a reason he could not yet fathom. With a half shrug he therefore claimed it with his rook.

Christine smiled, predatory, and moved her knight.

“And the others?” she asked. “Stephen – is he out of the hospital yet?”

Lester hesitated before nodding. “Physiotherapy is going well, or so I'm told.”

“And is he at home yet?” she pressed.

Lester couldn't think why she was so interested, but he was determined not to reveal anything that could be used to locate his team so he pretended not to have heard.

“Have you been practising with anyone else?”

Christine tapped her fingers, nails short and unpainted, against the table, making the chess pieces jump.

“I don't have a lot of visitors. I'm something of a persona non grata these days.”

Lester didn't want to dwell on why that was and was trying to think of something else to focus on when Christine took one of his knights.

Annoyed at his lapse in concentration he focused on the game for a few more moves, still half thinking of a safe topic when Christine once more interrupted his thoughts.

“And how is your wife? I heard she moved out.”

Lester paused with his fingers hovering over one of his pawns and moved it two spaces instead of the one he had been planning, but didn't dare suggest he take it back. Christine easily captured it with one of her pawns and the game was now moving decidedly in her favour.

“And how could you possibly have heard that?” he asked. He tried to keep the threat out of his voice but realised almost at once that he had not been successful. Christine sat back in her chair and licked her lips.

“By a process of deduction,” she said. “The tan line around your finger is more faded than it was the last time I saw you, which means you didn't just take it off before you came to see me, but that it's been off for some time.”

He felt her cross her legs under the table, her foot just grazing slightly against his ankle. He held his breath for two beats and then shifted his legs to the side and away from any further non-accidental contact. Christine narrowed her eyes.

“Very observant,” he said, knowing that it was dangerous to confirm her hypothesis even as he did so.

He deliberately turned back to the game and tried to remember the teachings of his old history professor at university. He had been a child chess prodigy back in the '40s and Lester had been one of the few students who could present him with any sort of challenge.

“And Cutter? How is he?” Christine asked.

This was dangerous territory indeed. Lester much preferred skirting around anything that could vaguely lead back to Helen.

“Let's just concentrate on the game, shall we?”

This he realised almost as soon as he had said it was exactly the wrong approach to take.

“I'm always concentrating on the game, _James_. It's you who seems to have forgotten the rules.”

“Christine,” he said, voice low in warning. “Please keep this civil.”

“Or what?” she asked.

They both knew the answer to this and both knew that Lester wasn't about to say it out loud without a lot more prompting. Christine snorted inelegantly and took one of Lester's pawns to add to her sizeable collection. Lester realised he was in grave danger of losing the game.

Lester wished that he had got himself something to drink before he started but now it was too late, there was no way he could leave while Christine was like this, almost visibly vibrating in her chair now that she sensed victory. He was reminded of a shark and a messy necropsy that seemed millennia ago.

“Your turn,” Christine said, waving magnanimously at the board, openly amused at his indecision.

He huffed a little, more annoyed at himself than her, and moved his rook. Two moves later it had joined the pile of pieces at Christine's side of the board.

He had been determined when he arrived that he wouldn't let her rattle him like this, and yet she still seemed to get under his skin even when she hardly said a word. It must have been the mention of his wife, he decided. Their marriage hadn't been perfect, but one of the imperfections had been a regrettable dalliance with the very woman sat in front of him and his wife had never quite forgiven him, even though she had stayed with him for a further six years.

“And what about that soldier? Becker? Still chasing after that skirt?”

Lester bristled at her dismissiveness towards Jess, but then decided it was probably for the best that she was underestimated and let it slide.

“He's very well, thank you.”

“I do like a man in uniform,” Christine said, licking her lips. Lester shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Christine laughed and looked around the room. “Not enough privacy to indulge my fantasies here, though.”

“I would think not,” Lester said. He sat up straight and wondered if it was possible for him to rig the game so that he could get out sooner than he had planned. Winning no longer seemed a useful strategy.

“Oh, have I wounded your sensibility, my dear little man?” Christine asked. She leaned forward, almost as if she were going to press a kiss to his cheek but then looked over to the side and moved back. Lester released the breath he was holding and rather recklessly moved his queen.

Christine laughed and took his bishop.

Lester tried to keep calm. She couldn't do anything to him, it was all just words and soon enough he would be back in his own world and she would be in hers. He wasn't even sure why he had agreed to these weekly chess games, unless it was a lingering sense of guilt at what had happened to her. In many ways her downfall would not have been so spectacular if both he and Jenny hadn't pulled in a lot of favours.

He moved a pawn and just as quickly Christine took it and then they began to play in earnest as Christine's collection of his pieces easily surpassed the meagre few of hers he'd been able to take. It was almost a relief when she took his queen and declared checkmate.

Lester sat considering the board for a few moments before nodding and agreeing. She was the victor this time.

“You need to concentrate more,” she said, “or this will get ever so boring. And I don't think you'd like me bored.”

Lester suppressed a shiver. “No, I'm sure I wouldn't.”

His internal clock told him it was about time for him to leave anyway so he slowly started to stand. Christine remained seated.

“It's been a pleasure to see you, as always, James. You'll forgive me if I don't see you out.” She smiled as she said it but they both knew it was no joke.

“I'll be back next week.”

“Perhaps you could see about bringing me a gift next time?” she suggested as Lester started to move away.

“A gift?” he asked. “What did you have in mind?”

“Chocolates, I think. Dark chocolates.”

Lester nodded. “If I can.”

Christine looked surprised and then pleased and turned away from him to prepare the chess board for another game. Lester watched her for a few moments but it was clear that as far as she was concerned he was no longer of any interest.

Turning away he presented himself to the door and waited as the locks whirred and the camera clicked and the guard opened the door and stood aside for him to leave. He walked down the soulless grey corridor of the unit and was met at the front door by the warder.

“How did you find her?” she asked.

“Mostly the same. She's asked for chocolates next visit.”

The warder nodded. “We'll have to x-ray them of course, but it should be fine. It will keep the rages at bay at least.”

Lester frowned. “Still bad?”

“The psychiatrist thinks it may be a complete personality shut down. She's better for a few days after you visit but then...” The warder trailed off and then shrugged. “She broke one guard's arm last week for putting too much salt in her food.”

Lester shook his head. He'd stopped reading the reports from the facility a few months ago, having too much other paperwork to deal with; perhaps he'd ask Lorraine to take on the task of summarising it before each visit, if she were amenable.

“There's no hope of release then?”

“It seems unlikely.”

“And the other prisoner?”

The warder's expression hardened. “She's made two more attempts today alone. I'm trying to get her transferred, actually. I don't think it's a good idea for Christine and Helen to be in the same facility even if they never mix. No one's told the other that they're here but I feel like they know anyway.”

Lester allowed himself a moment to cover his eyes with his hands and let his exhaustion show. There was a time he thought maybe these visits would do him or Christine some good, now he wasn't sure what he was doing. He wasn't quite sure whether it was Christine herself or their shared history that kept drawing him back like a moth to a flame.

“I'll talk to the Prime Minister,” Lester finally promised and the warder nodded, satisfied.

They said their goodbyes at the exit and Lester collected his watch and belt and shoelaces and put them on before heading outside to the car where Becker would be waiting to escort him back to the ARC.

He turned back and gazed at the nondescript grey government building that Christine and Helen called home. Perhaps, he thought to himself, it would be Christine he'd have moved, somewhere more colourful where she could walk and gather herself together. Somewhere where they could play chess outside and talk with a little less constraint. She'd like that.

He would like that too, he acknowledged. But only to himself.


End file.
